The Warlords Next Door
by H.J. Bender
Summary: It's Sage's party and he'll die if he wants to; hey, you'd die too if it happened to you. The Ronin of Light endures a catastrophic night of humiliation and torture, but there's a happy ending to his tale of woe. ON HIATUS
1. Here Comes the Neighborhood

It never occurred to any of them, not in their wildest dreams, that they would ever see the Warlords again.

It had been a few years and the Ronins had decided that it would be in their best interest to cohabitate with each other until they were sure all of the shit they'd been dealing with for the past four years had truly blown over. But living with each other wasn't that easy. Kento was a terrible housekeeper and he cluttered the living room with his workout equipment (but at least he was a good cook); Ryo had a 700-pound Siberian tiger sharing a bed with him and giant-cat hair was in everybody's laundry and all _over_ the furniture; Cye . . . was okay; Sage's virtue of courtesy (and daily meditation) was the only thing that kept him from going batshit insane in a house with no family hierarchy whatsoever; and Rowen ate all the food, had the sleeping habits of a narcoleptic, and had all sorts of revolting laundry habits. It was unbearable but they managed. They always got through somehow. They were Ronin Warriors.

Their house on Shinota Drive was kind of a dump with no real lawn or anything, but it was comfy and somewhat dilapidated enough to feel like home.

But this story isn't about the Ronins — it's about what moved in next door to the Ronins one Wednesday afternoon.

* * *

Ryo was the first to see the moving truck out the living room window and stepped outside to see what was up. He watched a few odd pieces of very antique-looking furniture get carried in, along with some sword racks and very large, heavy wooden crates that had bloody-murder-red ink warnings stamped all over them.

Ryo thought, _Wow. These new neighbors must be a real interesting family._

Then he saw a guy with long white hair, an eye patch, wearing a leather jacket, looking like goddamn Kurt Russell in _Escape from L.A_., step out from around the side of the moving van, and Ryo very nearly shit. The sight was just that bowel-moving.

"Oh my gosh," he uttered, staring.

Kurt looked up at him, stared a few moments, then lowered his head, sighed heavily, put his hands in his pockets, and walked over to the Ronins' yard with a world-weary saunter.

"Hi, Wildfire," he said, raising his head.

"Oh my gosh," Ryo repeated. "Dais? Y-you're. What, what are you . . ._ doing_? Here. In town, I mean?"

The ex-Warlord of Illusions gave a fleeting shrug and looked askance. "You know how it is."

Ryo stared. "No I don't." Pause. "Please inlight me."

"Enlighten."

"Unlighten me please."

Dais sighed again. "Look. I don't know about you, but spending the rest of eternity in the Nether Realm guarding the gates to the Mortal World doesn't exactly come with a pension plan."

Ryo's blank look assured Dais that nothing had gotten through.

"We bailed out."

"_We_?"

"Me and the gang."

"You're in a _gang_?"

Dais massaged the bridge of his nose. "Is Strata home? I might have better luck speaking with him."

Just then there came the unmistakable rapid-fire belching roar of a Harley approaching from down the street, and Ryo's hair stood on end when he saw what had arrived on it.

Cale, dressed completely in black and looking like a mutated cross between Johnny Cash and The Fonz, cut the engine and put the kickstand down by the curb in front of the Ronin house. He didn't take off his sunglasses. It wasn't even sunny.

"Hi, Sanada," he said to Ryo, grinning sharply. "I guess we're neighbors."

As Sanada was thinking of something to say in reply, there came a voice from the doorway behind him: "Ryo, what's going on out there?"

Sage.

Ryo fixed his eyes on Cale, who was still grinning sharply and looking more and more like _Jaws_.

"Nothing!" Ryo called.

The door was opening. "I thought I heard a motorcy—"

Ryo threw himself on the door and there was a bark of pain.

"RYO, WHAT THE HELL-!"

"Sage, get back in the house."

"Why?"

"Get back in the house."

"What for?"

"GET BACK IN THE DARN HOUSE!"

The door smashed open and Ryo went flying down. Sage stepped out onto the porch, nostrils flared and kanji glowing like all the neon in Vegas. "_You_," he fumed, "could at least have the simple _courtesy_ to tell me what's—"

His sentence stopped when he laid eyes on Dais, who took his hand out of his pocket to wave. "Hi."

Movement out of the corner of Sage's eye caught his attention, and he turned to see Cale dismount his shiny black Fat Boy, removing his sunglasses to expose the cross-shaped scar on his left eye. The blond's jaw went slack, and Cale smiled at him. Not sharply.

"Nice to see you haven't changed, Halo."

All the fight went out of Sage like a deflated balloon. "Cale," he said, and that was all he said.

Ryo had crawled to his knees just in time to get knocked in the head by the door as it was opened by someone new.

Cye, shirtless and unshaven, barefoot and brushing his teeth, stepped out onto the porch. "Huh mafes, wuff goin' on wiff all—" Then he saw. "—BFLUFFY _HEFF_!"

Toothpaste foam exploded everywhere. Like someone had put a bottle of Mr Bubble in an open blender. Cye stood on the porch looking utterly scandalized.

Dais walked over to help poor Ryo to his feet again.

"Thanks," Ryo grunted.

"Listen, Wildfire . . ."

"Ryo."

"Listen, Ryo . . ."

"Yeah?"

"Maybe it would be better if we just got everybody together and let the shock sink in nice and sl—"

There came a tremendous bang from the formerly-empty house next door, and who should come crashing out the door (literally—crashing and bouncing off the frame) but Sekhmet, predictably dressed in torn black jeans and a sweaty wife beater. He charged onto the front lawn and started break dancing all over the place, only it looked like he was having a seizure and doing the Mexican Hat Dance while asking the gods for rain. He was waving his arms wildly, clawing at his monster-green hair, and frantically patting himself down like he was on fire. Then he finally threw himself into the dirt and began writhing like a snake on a hot skillet.

Everyone on the Ronins' side just stared until the show was over.

Sekhmet picked himself up out of the dust cloud, noticed he had an audience, facepalmed, and then walked over to join them. "I apologize for that appalling display of lunacy," he muttered throatily.

"No biggie," said Ryo with a biggie fake smile.

"What was wrong?" Sage asked, eyes still wide with shock.

"Bees," said Sekhmet, as casually as if he were reading a grocery list.

"Bees," Sage repeated, lowering his head so he could gaze at the ex-Warlord of Venom below the fuzzy blond haze of his eyebrows.

Sekhmet nodded soberly.

"Which reminds me," Dais interrupted, "we need to explain a few things to you all."

"I'd flippin' say you better had," Cye agreed, holding his toothbrush in his fist like the Olympic Torch.

Deep breath. "Alright, here's how it is. In the Nether Realm, there is absolutely nothing to do."

"Nothing at all," Cale echoed, striding over to stand beside a very anxious-looking Sage.

"No wildlife, no scenery, no towns, no civilizations, no people—"

"No sex," murmured Cale, staring at Sage, who stared back.

"—no entertainment, no alcohol, nothing. Just bare land, a few temples, and the gate. And that's it. We're about to go insane."

"I don't blame you," Cye said, and resumed brushing his teeth as he listened.

"I don't jest," Dais muttered seriously, and jerked a thumb toward his snakey campadre. "Sekhmet here started hallucinating three days into it and hasn't stopped, and now he thinks he's being stalked by swarms of killer bees."

"I don't think, I _know_," Sekhmet amended sourly.

Dais pointed to the man in black who was leering at Sage. "Cale used to keep himself locked away in the pitch darkness until he was fucking catatonic—"

The Ronins reeled at the F-bomb spoken from the lips of one who still used words like "hearken" and "verily".

"—and we go in there after we haven't seen him for a few days and find him passed out, stark naked and twitching like he's going through rigor-mortis. It's madness over there! An asylum! I wouldn't banish _Talpa_ to that place!" Dais was clearly strung out and needed a cigarette. "You don't expect us to spend the rest of eternity in that hellhole in the sky, do you?"

Ryo, Sage and Cye all shook their heads.

Dais nodded and pulled himself together again. "For the sake of our sanity, we abandoned our stations. The Nether World isn't going anywhere. If danger arises we have our armors. We'll be ready."

"I'm ready right now," Cale uttered, gazing into Sage's lavender-blue eyes. Everyone else was apparently ignoring the ex-Warlord's blatant attempt to telepathically fuck the Ronin of Light to death.

"We had to get away," Sekhmet said. "From the bees."

"From the _boredom_," Dais reiterated. "So we came here."

"And moved next door to us," said Ryo.

"That was entirely coincidence."

"Yeah."

"Seriously. This was the cheapest place within fifty miles."

"Well, congratulations and welcome to Earth. I'm sure you'll fit in just fine."

At that moment Kento shouldered his way through the door and was right in the middle of asking Ryo if he'd seen his 20-pound dumbbells anywhere when he saw what the other Ronins had seen. Only his reaction was totally different.

"DAIS! Aw _man_, long time no SEE! What'cha been up to? Hey Cale, how's it goin'?"

"Fine."

"Sweet. Sekhmet! Stop hiding behind Dais and get over here! Aw, this is great! We're all back together again!" He slung one arm around Dais and one around Sekhmet. "You guys moving in? Awesome! We should have a barbecue or something tonight, it'll be like a family reunion!"

"Heaven help us," Sage uttered, leaning backwards to discreetly get away from Cale without being rude about it.

Right then Rowen slipped through the door, assessed the situation and knew exactly what was going on, what had transpired there, and exactly how it would fare for them all. He could do that. He was smart.

Rowen said, in his unintelligible Canadian-Mafia-whoknows accent, calm as a clam, "You guys'a in fer a maj'a culture shock."

"I doubt it not," said Dais.

Cye picked up the garden hose and proceeded to rinse the toothpaste out of his mouth. Even Cale stared.


	2. Barbecue

Kento flipped the kebabs and slathered more Jack Daniel's Spicy Original Teriyaki Mesquite Barbecue Sauce on the sizzling chicken, then took a huge swig from his beer, breathed deep the tangy smoke, and gave his balls a proud scratch. It was good to be a man.

Sekhmet stared at the grill from over Kento's shoulder. "So that's a barber cue, huh?"

"Yyyep."

"Why is it called a barber cue? It has nothing to do with barbers or their cues."

"Hell if I know, man, I just live here. Wanna beer?"

"A bier?"

"That's what I said."

"Uh." Sekhmet was having a hard time picturing how a coffin stand could possibly be relevant at a social gathering such as this, but the bee attack earlier that day had made him adventurous. "Sure."

He spent the next five minutes staring at the cold aluminum can in his hand before Kento had pity on the guy and cracked it open for him. And that was how Sekhmet became an alcoholic.

Ryo and Rowen meanwhile were tossing the old pigskin back and forth across the back yard, and essentially playing Monkey-in-the-Middle with White Blaze. If you've ever had older siblings, you understand how pissed off this tiger was. Eventually White Blaze got tired of being teased and went over to Sage's herb garden and dropped a steaming roll of crap on the parsley. If you've ever owned a cat, you understand how hellacious their excrement smells. And this was cat x 10 to the 6th power, which meant it was crap x 10 to the 6(s ±w30^z) where _s_ equals stink and _z_ equals size of the crap. Rowen actually expressed his disgust using this mathematical equation, and Ryo naturally thought he was talking about trees or something.

Dais and Cye sat at the rickety old picnic table and watched the other two Ronins. "What is the point of their game?" Dais asked.

Cye shrugged. "If you ask me, they're going about it all wrong. Football's played with the foot. At least where I come from."

"Where do you come from?"

"Porthleven."

"Where's that?"

"Cornwall."

"Where's that?"

"England."

"Where's that?"

"Great Britain."

"Where's that?"

"The United Kingdom."

"Where's that?"

"The British Isles."

"Where's that?"

"West of Japan."

"I've never left Japan."

"Well then." And Cye left it at that. "So how long are you blokes staying here then?"

"I don't know."

"Well, you ought to know some things about the neighborhood first: garbage comes on Thursdays, so if you get your things moved in and unpacked by tonight then you'll be able to get the trash out in time for pick-up. Tuesday evening is game night here, you know, because we'd all go mad if we didn't do it. Wednesday is the best time to hit the food mart since they restock everything mid-week . . . Are you writing this down?"

Dais stared dully across the picnic table, arms crossed over his leather jacket. "I left my secretary in the Nether World."

Cye scowled and grinned at the same time as he pointed a finger at the Warlord. "You're a right bastard, Dais. I like you."

"Thanks." He looked around suddenly. "What happened to Cale?"

* * *

The ex-Warlord of Darkness stood wordlessly in the middle of the kitchen and watched the Ronin of Light bustle about while pretending not to be disturbed. Sage wore an expression that would frighten a gorilla but Cale was cheerfully and intentionally ignorant, passing the occasional wink or grin Sage's way. This only made the him more irritated. Hoping that perhaps some clear signals of hostility would do the trick (because Sage was _way_ too courteous to tell Cale to get the fuck out of the kitchen), the Ronin drew the largest butcher knife from the block on the counter and slammed it through a head of lettuce, slicing it perfectly in half. Cale just kept smiling. Growling under his breath, Sage set to work chopping the lettuce and carrots and green peppers. As loudly and violently as he could.

Cale continued to stare. I wish you could have seen Sage, because he looked like a _demon_. Obviously his polite tactics were not working on a scarred, toughened warrior who was quite comfortable with verbal and physical abuse from his comrades. That and the fact that Cale was, despite his netherworldly associations, a simple flesh-and-blood-and-balls kind of man, incapable of mind-reading or any other magical traits that women think men have, these angry vibes went completely over his head, and this was why he got just a little bit curious when Sage let out a ferocious roar and flung the knife at him.

Cale tilted his head to the side and let the blade thud into the wall behind him, then he grabbed the unattended cleaver off the counter because Sage was coming at him with one of those tin-can cutting knives from those As Seen on TV commercials, and Cale needed to defend himself or he was going to be taking a ride in the back of the meat wagon later.

Metal met metal with a piercing shriek and the handle of Sage's knife abruptly broke. "Nineteen ninety-five piece of _crap_!" he screamed, grabbing the Tupperware carrot bowl and chucking it at his nemesis. Then he backed up against the counter and drew two knives—a scaling knife and a carving knife—and with a battle cry of _Tao Rei_, launched himself at Cale.

Shit went everywhere and the kitchen was nearly demolished by the time it was all said and done. It was tough being an ex-Warlord, Cale realized. The good guys will never be completely comfortable with the idea that you're on their side, and there was no way Sage was going to be able to tolerate living next door to a man that regularly made attempts on his life once upon a time.

After ten minutes of feverish mayhem, which included stabbing cabinets, avalanches of pots and pans, raking gouges in the formica counter top, breaking dishes and sending carrot peels and hearts of romaine raining to the floor, Cale got careless, stepped into White Blaze's food dish, and got the back of his hand nicked by Sage's scaling knife. "Damn, Halo!" he cried, dropping the meat cleaver.

Sage bellowed like a raging, disease-maddened cow and ran both knives to the hilt into the wall where the Warlord had been standing seconds before. Cale took the opportunity to snatch up the bowl of salad and slam it onto the Ronin's head. That seemed to cool him down. Or maybe it was the salad dressing that was running down the side of his face. All action froze, and very verrrry slowly Sage lifted the bowl to glare hatefully at Cale, who was trying not to herniate a bowel laughing at the sight of that poor kid with lettuce and carrots and low-fat Hidden Valley Italian in his hair.

It was at this time that the rest of the gang came barging indoors, apparently curious about the racket they'd been hearing for the past ten minutes but had no intention of investigating until it had ceased. Kento crossed his arms over his "Kill It & Grill It" apron and demanded, "What in the hell is goin' on here?"

Sage could not wait—he pointed his finger at Cale and cried, "He tossed my salad!"

Cye facepalmed and Kento arched an eyebrow. "_Did_ he now?"

Sage went white. Whiter than usual. "NO! No, he tried to kill me!"

"Yeah. I sure did," Cale muttered, holding his bleeding hand.

"And now the salad is _ruined_."

"Nobody eats the salad but you, Sage," Ryo said matter-of-factly.

"But the fact remains that I was in here _minding_ my own business when Mister—" Sage fumbled for words. "—Donnie _Darko_ here came in and ruined my salad."

Cale glared at Sage. "You whine like a beaten she-dog."

The Ronin's mouth fell open in a wordless gasp. "How _dare_ you come into _my_ kitchen—"

"—and demand that you slice me up. I'm _so_ sorry, how insensitive of me . . . And what the hell is this I'm stepping in?"

"Catfood," said Ryo.

"It smells like shit."

"Bingo," Rowen said.

A brief silence followed, then Kento put his hands on his hips. "Well, the chicken's almost done so everybody come out and grab a plate."

Sage pointed to his head. "I can't eat right now. I've got salad dressing in my hair."

"Hey up," said Cye, "I'll take care of it. Water's my specialty, after all. Come here." He walked over to Sage and took him by the shoulder, led him to the sink, and bodily bent him over it. Sage let out a squawk of surprise but it was too late—Cye had turned on the water and doused Sage's hair with the hose sprayer.

A short while later everybody was squeezed in together at the picnic table. Sage's hair was wrapped in a kitchen towel and his wet shirt clung to his body. He did not look very happy, certainly not picnic material.

"Pass me the chips, Ryo."

Ryo handed the bag to Kento and turned to the ex-Warlords. "So, have you guys gotten moved in yet?"

"No," Sekhmet muttered, mouth full of chicken. "The bees held us up."

"What the hallucinating fool _means_," Dais rephrased, "is that we just got here today, so no. We're far from moved in."

"Maybe we could help you blokes out," Cye offered. "You might even make it in time for garbage pick-up."

Dais cocked his head. "You're really into this garbage thing, aren't you?"

"Always looking for the opportunity to get the rotting refuse out of the house before plague sets in."

"Is it really that bad?"

"Drop by one Wednesday and see for yourself."

* * *

The barbecue was drawing to a close around sunset, and Cye's suggestion about helping the Warlords move in was taken up by all, even Sage, because even though he was still pissed off at Cale he was far too polite to be the only one to refuse. Fortunately there wasn't a lot of stuff to unpack. Mostly just furniture and sword racks and armor cases and mysterious trunks covered in locks and chains and had ancient hexes painted on them proclaiming death to any soul who dared open them. Ryo was helping Sekhmet move such a trunk, one that was tremendously heavy, and grunted, "Dude, what the heck is in here? It's friggin' heavy!"

"My granite, lead-coated meditation blocks," answered Sekhmet. "It helps keep the bees away."

Ryo dropped his end with a dismayed moan and took a break to wipe the sweat from his brow.

Outside, Rowen and Cye were moving the last box indoors. They dropped it into the center of the living room, where Sage was insisting that he knew more about decorating according to Tai-chi than Dais and was happily arranging the ex-Warlords' living room for them. Kento in passing patted Dais and said, "Don't argue with him. When we leave you can do whatever you want with this place. Just don't get him pissy."

Dais did as he was advised and when 11:00 rolled around the whole gang found themselves in the living room, sitting on Nether World furniture in a 1977 suburban two-story with orange carpets and flowery wallpaper, drinking American sodas from Rowen's personal stash.

"Well," Rowen said, "I s'pose all ya need to do now is get IDs, residence certificates, health insurance and jobs."

"I was afraid of this," Cale muttered in Dais' direction.

"Hey, _I _wasn't the one who wanted that idiotic steam-powered bicycle—"

"For your information it's called a rotillermotora, and anyway I found it in that alley so you—"

"How am I going to get life insurance with those bees after me?" Sekhmet moaned. "I need a bier." He cradled his head in his hands. Cye reached over and gave him a comforting pat on the shoulder.

Ryo, eyes wide and fixed in a distant stare, set his Diet Coke on his knee and shook his head slowly back and forth. Kento massaged his forehead. "And I thought _we_ had problems. I sit corrected."


	3. KABOOM!

It was a typical Saturday morning. The sun was about to rise, it was still dark and cool out, and Ryo was sleeping peacefully under his Spiderman bed sheets when from out on the lawn there arose such a thunder that he sprang from his bed in terrified wonder. And he stepped right on White Blaze's slumbering body.

As the 700-pound Siberian tiger let out a roar and sent Ryo hurtling face first toward the dresser, the Ronin of Fire had but one thought (and one thought only) in his mind: Talpa was back to kill him, and this time he was actually going to do it. Then Wildfire smashed his chiclets into the dresser and the only thing left in his brain was the Windows 95 starfield screensaver.

Another peal of thunder rattled the windows as Ryo lay on the floor holding his face and groaning in agony. White Blaze, fur fluffed in agitation like some kind of mutant cotton ball, immediately decided that he'd had enough of this Dynasty shit to last him a lifetime and began to maniacally claw his way under Ryo's twin sized bed. By the time he managed to wedge himself underneath it, the floor was coated in gouges that bled sawdust and only two of the bed legs were actually touching the ground.

A third deafening crash shook the house to its foundation and suddenly Cye burst into Ryo's room, looking panicked and just barely awake. "Fucking _hell_!" he swore violently without restraint—his true colors were showing, and they were red, white and blood. "What in the bloody blazes is that awful fucking row! Who's respon—good Lord, _Ryo_? Is that you, mate? What hap—" **KABOOM!** "—_blimey fucking bollocks_!"

"What's going on?" Sage shouted breathlessly, suddenly appearing in the doorway. He was wearing smiley face boxer shorts and had a case of bedhead so sexy that celebrities would pay $250 in a Hollywood salon to look that good. "Is it the Dynasty?"

"Sounds like the bloody Yanks finishing World War II—"

**KABOOM! **

Ryo sat up groggily and saw two blonds and two brunettes standing in his room. Then the screensaver in his brain locked up and was replaced by the Blue Screen of Death. "Lallc yer yarmers," he slurred. "Mab topaz snurggin' mah gravy." Then his pretty blue eyes rolled back in his head and he hit the floor in a dead faint.

"Oh my God, that last chromosome just gave out," Sage said, as if he'd been expecting it for some time now.

Cye crouched down at Ryo's side. "No, looks like he tapped himself against the bureau."

"Huh?"

**KABOOM! **

Cye pointed out the streak of bloody snot on one of the drawers. "Like a bird whacking a window. Shits itself on impact."

"I wonder if the Cowardly Tiger under the bed had anything to do with it."

**KABOOM!**

"Alright," Cye muttered, standing up and stomping to the window, "this is starting to piss me off. What the fuck is going on out there?" He parted the blinds and stared down at the house next door.

**KABOOM!** A hot, blinding light flared from the open garage. It could have been flames, but it also could have been a small nuclear explosion. Or maybe a rip in the space-time continuum.

Cye let the blinds snap shut and he turned to give Sage a knowing glare. "It's those fucking cunts next door. They've twocked a jet and now they're chopping the bloody afterburners!"

Sage closed his eyes and breathed through his nose. "Cye, it's too early in the morning for the C word."

". . . Chop?"

"Will you please speak a form of English I can understand? Perhaps one that isn't punctuated with profan—"

Sage didn't get to complete his request before Rowen, who would never have oozed from bed at this hour for anything less than the end of the world, barreled through the doorway, plowed right into him, and sent them both sprawling onto the floor. Sage's reflexes were a bit sharper than Rowen's this morning and he managed to land on his hands and knees instead of his face. Rowen thudded into Sage's back and rolled off with a sharp "Ow!"

**KABOOM!**

Sage crawled up and punched Rowen's thigh as hard as he could. "Watch where you're going, egghead!"

"Well don't stand in the doorway, fatass! Get in or get out, it's a simple decision!"

While Sage went red in open-mouthed shock, Rowen gave a cheery wave to Torrent. "Mornin', Cye. Ryo run inta the wall again?"

"Bureau."

He winced. "Ssss. Ouch."

**KABOOM!**

"Well," Rowen said, "I guess we betta go oveh an' tell the Warlords to knock it off, eh?" (He knew it was them. He was smart.)

"I'm going to knock them all for six if they don't bloody stifle it," Cye muttered. "It's not even seven in the fucking morning."

"Hey _dudes_!" Kento was suddenly in the doorway, wide awake, covered with motor grease and grinning like a possum licking a light socket. "You've gotta come see the new mods I helped put on Cale's Harley! It's friggin' sa-WEEE-eeeet!" Pause. "Don't all come rushing at once or anything. Jeez. I've seen happier faces at a morgue. Now come on, we only spent all night workin' on it!"

* * *

Seven-thirty in the morning saw three Ronins gathered in the driveway next door like a herd of sleepy sheep, staring with sleepy, slightly-homicidal expressions at the shiny black Fat Boy up on blocks. Kento and Cale were proudly explaining how they got the new deafening exhaust pipes outfitted to the bike (or rotillermotora as Cale called it) and how easy it was to replace the engine with something much more powerful. And noisy.

"Why all the modifications?" Rowen asked at the end of the show. "Ya just junked an othawise efficient means 'a transp'tation by addin' all this flashy crap to it. I bet the engine's displacin' only about 75 pacent of what it could, and there's no way the handlebars're aerodynamic when they're like that." He sipped his sugar-loaded coffee daintily. "This thing would be much better off if it were water-cooled. I should work on that design."

Cale and Kento stared at Rowen as if a giant alien spider had just crawled out of his mouth wearing the uniform of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, tipped its hat, and waved at them.

"Since when do you know so damned much about bikes, Rowen?" Kento asked warily. As if his friend might actually be Hannibal Lecter.

Rowen shrugged. "I don't. I just know a lot about mechanical engineering."

Cale, who was a little less impressed, said, "To answer your question, Strata—"

"Hashiba."

"Hashi—"

"Rowen."

"Rowen." Pause.

Rowen just smiled kindly.

"To answer your question, Rowen, we modified it because we wanted it to look 'wicked'. And that's the only reason."

"Ohhh, right. Wicked." Wink. "Gotcha."

"Well," Cye huffed moodily, "if it's alright with the grease monkeys, may we return to the comfort of our beds now that your experiment in breaking noise ordinances has been successful?"

"Of course," Cale said, flashing a dazzling smile in Sage's direction. "Do forgive our noise. I would hate to _arouse_ anyone from a peaceful sleep."

"Quite," Cye sniffed. (That's how the British accept apologies.)

"Eh, I wasn't sleepin' anyway," Rowen commented. "I was actually just about to go to bed, but since I've already had my coffee I guess I'll just have to go to sleep sometime this aftanoon . . ." He wandered back toward the house talking to himself, Cye and Kento following behind, Sage bringing up the rear. But Sage was stopped when Cale gently caught his elbow.

He turned around to find the tall, dark, outrageously greasy and wildly handsome Warlord staring down at him with a slight grin. "Maybe you'd like to take a ride with me sometime," he said in the lowest, sexiest voice he could summon. "It'll be a hard ride, being such a powerful machine, but I'm sure you can handle it. I can go fast or slow . . . however you like it. Whatever you want."

Sage curled his lip, showing off his incisors. "I'd rather scour my genitals off with a rusty Brillo pad." He placed a hand on Cale's chest and pushed. It wasn't hard enough to make the man step back, but it did move him. A tad.

Cale looked dejected. "You're not impressed then?"

"Not a bit."

"Oh. That's too bad," he murmured. "See, the whole reason I tricked out this rotillermotora was to impress people. Bouncers have to have a tough ride, you know?"

Sage would have fled the scene at this point, but his curiosity got the better of him. "Bouncer?" he repeated.

"Yeah. Just got hired last week. The Wild Sushi Roadhouse on the edge of town."

Sage didn't know it, but it sounded like a dive. A tough, dangerous, manly dive. He swallowed dryly. "Congratulations. Beating up drunks sounds like a fine way to make a living." He about-faced and started to walk away.

Cale grinned. "You're welcome to stop by and say hello any time."

"Okay. I'll just put that on my To _Don't_ list." A few steps later he paused, turned halfway. "By the way, idiot, it's a _motorcycle_."

* * *

Ryo was still out cold when Sage returned to the house. Though he was inclined to let Ryo just sleep it off, he wanted to at least have one good thing to show for an otherwise ruined morning. He dragged Ryo off of the floor and put him back in bed (the tiger was gone now and apparently yowling for breakfast downstairs), and after a few moments of deep concentration with his hand pressed to Ryo's forehead, the busted nose and bruised forehead were healed. Sage stood up, congratulated himself on a job well done, and then decided that maybe the day wasn't off to such a horrible start. He went to his room, got dressed, and met the others downstairs in the kitchen.

White Blaze was hunched over his food dish and munching away at God only knows what, but it smelled only a _little_ bit better than dead dog casserole. Cye, now in a much better mood with a crumpet and cup of oolong under his belt, was chatting pleasantly with Rowen, who was having Pop Tarts and Mountain Dew for breakfast. Sage slid into the chair beside him and made a face at the sugary repast.

"You're going to rot your guts out, Rowen," he predicted with stark clarity. "Or your teeth."

"Well at least I have taste buds. What're _you_ havin' fer breakfast? Plain oatmeal n' white toast, eh?"

"There's jam on the toast."

"Yeah? Where?"

"Right there."

"That's barely a smear. A grape wiped its ass on yer toast, and ya think that's part of a balanced breakfast?"

"Rowen, just cut it out or I'll tell Cale you're harassing me and he'll come over here and kick your ass."

Rowen's eyebrows shot up and an intrigued grin spread across his face. "Oh _really_?"

Sage went white. _I can't believe I just said that_, he thought.

"Yeah, Cale's a real macho man!" Kento chimed in around a mouthful of scrambled eggs. "He got a job working at the Wild Sushi Roadhouse as a bouncer."

"Ya don't say," Rowen declared.

"Yup. And Dais got a job through a temp service. Some kind of office gig or cubicle type job or somethin'. I don't even think _he _knows what he's doing."

"Ya kiddin'," Rowen said.

"I thought the only place that'd hire a bloke like him would be a kiddie theme park." Cye sipped his tea. "Or the post office."

"It's funny you should mention that . . ."

From somewhere up the road there came the screeching of tires. Kento's expression became serious.

"Sekhmet spent a whole month getting rejected from every job he applied for."

The rev of an engine. A sudden screech. A bang. A pause. Another screech and rev.

"But finally he found a place that didn't send him away."

Rev. Screech. Bang. Pause. Louder rev. Louder screech. It was coming closer.

Rowen's face went slack. Sage's one visible eye went wide. Cye held the teacup en route to his mouth and stared over the rim at the view outside the kitchen windows. A view that looked right down the front walk and the mailbox at the very end.

The boxy shape of an ancient Japanese mail truck suddenly plowed up over the sidewalk and slammed into the mailbox, uprooting it to a thirty degree angle. Behind the wheel the driver, with green hair and a postal uniform, cursed for the 45th consecutive time and tossed loose junkmail onto the front lawn, then took off with a screech.

"A guy who's gone postal actually works fer the postal service," Rowen ascertained, a lunatic grin tugging the corner of his mouth. "Ya gotta be shittin' me."


	4. How the Grinch Stole Cable

It was a sunny, late afternoon in May, and Rowen was in the back yard. He swung lazily back and forth in the hammock, a pair of earbuds jammed into his ear canals and issuing the relaxing, soothing melodies of Tool from an MP3 player that he'd assembled himself out of spare computer parts and a TI-82 calculator. His jaw was busy working the shell off a sunflower seed, which he spat across the lawn and reached into his pocket for another. He'd just spent a grueling day sleeping through the remaining 80 minutes of his final exams and pouring Red Bull down his hatch, and felt that he owed himself a good lazing.

Unlike most afternoons at Delta Rho Nin house, this one was quiet and serene, a picture of lower-middle-class Japanese suburbia, sword-gouged, arrow-studded stockade fence and everything. The other members of Team Ronin were out busy with after-school activities; Ryo, for example, was at soccer practice ("football" in European) and trying to kick his way through community college; Sage, who was going to school for no real reason at all other than it was simply something to do, was probably hanging out at that ritzy kendo dojo uptown and filling the new students with splinters; Kento could always be found at the gym this time of day—or next door with his new best friends, the Warlords; and Cye, depending on his mood, was either down at the docks working on his nautical knowledge of Marconi rig sailboats, or enjoying darts and a warm lager at the only English pub in Japan, The Crown & Anchor.

Yes, it was a lovely afternoon to be home alone.

Rowen sang along under his breath, "_Over-thinking, over-analyzing separates the body from the mind_ . . ."

From over the tall fence that completely blocked the view next door, Cale's head popped into view. He had a black eye and a busted lip. (Rough night at the office.) "Hey, Strata."

Rowen had the music cranked loud enough to drown out the Crack of Doom, and his eyes were closed behind his sunglasses. He was as deaf as a post and blind as a bat. "_Witherin' my intuition, leavin' opportunities behind_—"

"STRATA."

"_Feed my will to feel this moment, urgin' me to cross the line_—"

Cale disappeared for a moment, came back up with an empty gas can, and chucked it at the oblivious Ronin. The can banged against Rowen's shoulder and he sat up with a start. The section of gutter that had slowly been working its way free for the past half hour finally groaned and gave up; Rowen thudded hard onto the grass between the side of the house and the scrawny, partially-dead maple tree. Half a second later the gutter, still attached to one end of the hammock, came crashing down. All 20-something feet of it. Onto the patio, the lawn, from one end of the house to the other. It was like a scene from _Clark Griswold Does_ _This Old House_.

Rowen looked positively shocked and bewildered, sunglasses hanging from one ear. Then he saw the gas can, saw Cale, solved the equation to the nearest tenth, and calmly removed his earbuds. "Whadda ya want?"

Cale leaned against the fence. "I found a magic box. I need you to help me make it work."

* * *

Rowen stared down at the television in the driveway. It was so old it still had dials (remember those?) and woodprint plastic around the screen. He put his hands in his pockets and turned his head to spit more seeds. "That's a CRT television, Cale."

"What's that?"

Rowen, realizing that the question would be too difficult to answer for someone who was born before soap was invented, ignored him and said, "Where'd ya get it?"

"I found it in the alley behind the roadhouse. It was a bitch to carry home."

"I bet. It must weight about, what, 20 kilos?"

"I don't know. All I know is that I've seen these magic boxes before and they work. This one doesn't. You're smart, Strata. You can make it work, can't you?"

Rowen squatted down, chewing a shell thoughtfully. "Have ya tried pluggin' it in?"

"To what?"

"A wall socket."

Silence.

"Ya mean you've been livin' here for three months and ya haven't used a wall socket? Ya got electricity, don't ya?"

"Yes. No. What's electricity?"

Rowen's mouth fell open in horror, and the rest of the bird feed he was chewing spilled out onto the concrete.

* * *

Sundown was approaching as Cye turned into the driveway and dismounted his bicycle, whistling a merry sea shanty as he parked his eco-friendly ride beside the 1989 Geo Tracker that belched smoke like a Russian arms factory. He entered through the garage door, tripping over Ryo's cleats and Kento's gym bag, and tossed his knapsack onto the kitchen table. He went about heating up the kettle for tea and wondered what he was going to have for dinner when suddenly he realized that it was absolutely quiet.

This was a most disconcerting revelation.

"Hey mates?" he called. No reply. He peeked into the living room and glanced at the darkened stairwell. "Hallo? Anyone here?"

Something wasn't right. It was obvious that the rest of the Posse was home, the evidence was all over the floor, but there were no sounds of slamming doors, thumping footsteps, glass breaking, tigers roaring, or Sage shouting for a little peace and quiet. Either they were dead or outside somewhere. Cye turned back into the kitchen and was abruptly face-to-face with Sage.

It was the cheapest horror flick trick in the book, but like all cheap horror flick tricks, it still worked on people with nervous disorders at least once.

"AUUUUUUGH!" screeched Cye, throwing himself backward against the door frame.

Sage, whose approach had been about as conspicuous as thin air, didn't even bat his eye. He could have batted the other one, but it was covered by hair so no one would ever know if he did or didn't. He stood there expressionlessly and waited for Cye to calm himself.

"What the hell are you trying to do?" Cye demanded. "Give me a heart attack?" (Cye speaks proper British English, so he says "heart" like "hot", not "art" like some wretched plebeian Scouse or destitute Cockney scumbag.)

"They're all next door," Sage said flatly. "Some kind of techno-geek pizza party."

". . . And you're not invited?"

"I'm not going."

"Why not?"

"Isn't it obvious?"

Cye cocked his head.

Sage rolled his eye and crossed his arms. "I don't know why I don't just move back to Sendai and live with my parents," he muttered. "Nobody pays any attention to me in this house. Nobody cares about my happiness. Nobody—"

"Oh stop your whining, you sopping bint," Cye scolded, grabbing Sage firmly by the arm. "Honestly, for someone whose armor glows in the dark, you couldn't lighten up if you were a bloody Christmas tree."

"Cye, if you even think about dragging me over there, I will stab you in the heart with an icepick."

"Mate, you couldn't stab a pincushion without feeling guilty. Now shut your gob and put on your happy face."

"This _is_ my happy face," Sage muttered, wearing an expression that made Dr Gregory House look like Jim Carrey on nitrous oxide.

"Oh dear," Cye said. "Well, no matter. I'm sure once we get there you'll be the life of the party."

* * *

Sage sat squashed between Dais and Sekhmet on the battered leather sofa with a greasy piece of pepperoni pizza slowly soaking its way through the paper plate in his hand. Rowen and Cale were hovering over the television set in the living room. Electronic guts were spewed out onto the floor. Broken vacuum tubes had been disassembled, recalibrated, and reassembled. Drills and pliers and screwdrivers were scattered hither and thither. There were a few new holes in the wall, and some of Rowen's spare coaxial cable (he always had a use for coaxial cable) had been implemented to run from the cable box down the street and directly into the living room of Masho Manor. And only Rowen knew how to jury-rig this mofo so that the cable company would never know that someone on Shinota Drive was getting free HBO. Rowen was smart. He could do that.

Ryo, Kento and Cye were enthusiastically devouring pizza and pop and offering their amateur advice to Rowen, who didn't bother telling them that he was an expert on this subject and they were all wrong as hell. Between bites of pizza and swigs of sugary death, he was well on his way to getting the Warlords addicted to game shows and reality TV.

"He's pretty smart," Dais commented to Sage.

"He's a show-off," Sage muttered moodily.

"Is he?"

"He graduated high school at fourteen and already had two Bachelors by the time we were all entering college. He just finished his Masters in engineering last year and now he's working on his Doctorate. His Doctorate! He's only twenty-one!"

Dais took a bite of crust. He didn't understand anything of what the Ronin was saying, but he understood the tone. "You seem jealous, Halo."

"Who wouldn't be?" Sage scoffed. "He's a disgusting genius. He's probably gonna go work for NASA or something when he graduates. You know he's fluent in Russian? French is his second language, too. My _father's_ French and I don't speak French."

"You're still friends with him, aren't you?"

"Yeah. But it's hard to be friends with someone who's just so . . . so much smarter than you." His tone fell toward the end, sounding almost depressed. Dais picked up on it.

"Do you wish you could be as smart as Strata?"

"Me? No way. I'd go nuts if I had to live with all that stuff crowding my skull."

"Then why don't you let bygones be bygones and accept that you're all special in your own different way?"

"Because that's something only a delusional fucking madman would say . . . Pardon my French."

Dais looked at Sage.

Sage looked at Dais.

"Heh," chuckled Sage.

The lighthearted moment was interrupted by a tremendous belch on the other side of the couch. Sage and Dais stared in disgust as Sekhmet crushed his fourth beer can against his forehead and dropped it to the floor, along with his greasy plate. The front of his postal uniform was covered in pizza slops.

"So, Sekhmet," Dais said loudly, "how's work?"

"Damn awful," he grunted. "Damn bees. Damn mail. Damn mail boxes. Damn dogs. Damn cats. Damn old women." He reached into the cooler beside the couch and cracked open his fifth beer. "Damn kids. Damn pedestrians. Damn traffic. Damn bees." He took a slug. "You?"

"Oh, I got fired again."

"Damn."

"You got fired?" Sage asked, passing his untouched plate to Sekhmet, who asked no questions and set to work eating his pain away.

Dais sighed and slumped back into the cushions. "I've been through two jobs already. Apparently my skills as a telemarketer are under appreciated."

"That's not how it's supposed to be," Sage said with a shake of his head. "You're the Warlord of Illusions, not an office jockey. Surely there's something better you could do."

Dais loosened his tie. He looked bad in a suit. Like, monstrously bad. "I don't know. I guess I just have to wait and find my true calling."

"I'll drink to that," Sekhmet toasted, raising his beer.

"Got it!" Rowen exclaimed. He turned the dial and there it was, television in all its stolen Technicolor glory. He used the universal remote control he had built from scratch in fifteen minutes to change the channels, flash after flash of sex, violence, infomercials and the half a million sports channels that nobody ever watches.

"You made it work," Cale gawked, staring at the screen. "You must be a wizard!"

Rowen handed him the remote. "I'm not a wizard, it's simple shit. There any more pizza left?"

Ryo and Kento helped move the TV against the wall, and then everyone parked their glutes in front of it and passed beers and more pizza around, and Sage was eventually, grudgingly glad that he had allowed Cye to drag him to this insane gathering; Dais had actually engaged in meaningful conversation with him, something he rarely got at home, and he didn't feel as if he needed to swallow a bottle of sleeping pills before going to bed tonight. Why, he'd even been able to spend the entire evening without being accosted by that crude, vulgar, boorish and uncouth—

Cale plopped down into Sekhmet's empty place and draped his arm on the back of the couch, sending Sage a feral smile. "Hello, Sunshine. Having a nice evening, are we?"

Sage leaned away and looked in the opposite direction. "Nicknames are rude and hurtful," he muttered. "And I _was_ having a nice evening with Dais here, thank you very much."

"Really, Dais?" Cale looked up at the older Warlord and sent him a glare with daggers and blood in the postscript. And suddenly Dais had to get up and go get more beer.

"That's better," Cale said, inching closer to our helpless hero. "It seems your friend is quite the magician. Do _you_ know any magic tricks, Sunshine?"

Sage scooted further over and crossed his arms and legs protectively. "No. But if I did, my first act would be to make you disappear."

"Ouch," Cale grinned, sneaking his hand onto Sage's thigh. "Even without a sword you still cut me. I'd say that's magic."

"And I say you've got three seconds to get your hand off of my leg before I call up Halo and liberate your head from your neck." He slapped the offending limb away. "Now leave me alone."

"If that's the way you want it," Cale said airily, latching his hands behind his head and crossing his ankle over his knee. He was wearing snakeskin cowboy boots, Sage noticed. How abhorrently manly of him. "I just think it's a shame how you shut everybody out. The light is supposed to be warm and . . . gentle."

Sage turned to give Cale a cold, un-gentle glare. "I'm not that kind of light." He blinked. "What happened to your face?"

"Oh, this?" Cale gingerly touched the purple mouse under his eye. "Occupational hazard. Gotta make a living, right?"

Sage's face was half-sympathetic, half-disgusted. Mostly disgusted. "It looks gruesome."

"Ah." Cale waved and grinned. "It's fine. Besides, you gave me worse back in the day, remember?"

Despite himself, Sage started feeling guilty. Probably passed down through his Catholic father. "Does it hurt?"

"Confidentially?"

Nod.

"Like a motherfucker. I almost passed out after the first hit."

Sage felt a little bit glad that Cale could admit to such a shameful injury. A small part of him was even laughing with schadenfreude that the stupid barbarian had gotten his face handed to him. But a growing part of him (not that part), the part that possessed the compassionate virtues of grace and courtesy, was struggling to break the surface of his cold exterior.

"He must have been a big guy."

"Hm?"

"The guy that did all this to you."

Cale sighed again. "Confidentially?"

Nod.

"It was a woman."

Sage's mouth fell ajar, his lone eye owl-wide.

"She was a big lady," Cale said, drifting off into the Gaussian-blurred world of a flashback. "Two, maybe three thousand pounds. She had a mullet and tattoos and a cigar. Had a fist the size of a jack-o-lantern, and about as many teeth. Her name was Mickey. Her friends called her Mini. I think that's what you call a misnomer."

Sage uncrossed his legs and sat in awkward silence for a few moments. Then he said, very quietly so that no one else could hear his voice over the TV, "Close your eyes, Cale."

The ex-Warlord of Darkness froze in shock for two reasons. 1) Sage called him by name without the words "fuck you" or "die" preceding it, and 2) his tone sounded as if he were about to do something he would regret for a long, long time, and that filled Cale with hope. And blind, slobbering lust.

Stifling his baser instincts, Cale obediently closed his eyes without a word and sat very still. He felt the couch cushion dip as Sage moved closer to him, and then the soft warmth of a hand covering his injured eye, and another hand resting over his lips. "Don't move," Sage whispered. "Don't open your eyes. Just breathe and think of nothing."

The first two things were easy, but the last one was a bit harder. You'd have to be the fricking Buddha to sit there and think of nothing, especially if you were as desperately lonely and oversexed as a Dynasty Warlord and being caressed by your former enemy and the object of your insatiable animal lust. So while Cale failed and failed hard at the last request, he obeyed the first two, and after maybe a minute or so of teeth-gritting, heart-thumping agony, Sage removed his hands and Cale opened his eyes.

"Don't make a habit out of this," the Ronin warned, then stood up and walked into the kitchen to avoid any more homoerotic innuendo for which this author greatly apologizes.

Cale reached up and touched his eyelid, which was as perfect and healed as it had been before he met Miss Mini.

* * *

"I saw that."

Sage turned from the sink with a half-empty (or full) glass of water and sent optical lightning bolts toward Cye, who was smirking knowingly. "You saw nothing."

"Rubbish. You healed him. You're starting to _like_ him, aren't you?"

"I'm starting to hate him a little less passionately if that's what you mean," Sage huffed, ducking his head in the manner he always used when he was curl-up-and-die embarrassed. "And stop smiling like that. It's creepy."

"Alright, I won't tease. But really, I'm glad you two are getting on well enough. We should all learn to get on with each other. We are neighbors, after all."

The delusional fucking madman strikes again. "Fine," Sage mumbled. "Just don't go telling all the guys what I did. I don't want them to get the wrong idea."

"How could _that_ ever happen?" Cye winked. "Don't worry, I won't tell."

"I know," Sage said. (Thank Torrent for the virtue of trust, right?) Then, "Hey, I'm in the mood for tea and I was gonna boil some water. You want some, too?"

A blank look crossed Cye's face, followed by a funny one, followed by a hilarious one. "OH MY GOD!" he screamed, hands pressed to his cheeks and eyes the size of Boston cream pies. "I LEFT THE BLOODY KETTLE ON!"

And that was the last time the Ronins were able to use that particular excuse to leave the Warlords' house.


	5. Epic Mail

The houses on Shinota Drive were pretty old. If "pretty" is another word for "fucking". The bedrooms induced claustrophobia, the bathrooms had poor plumbing and no Fart Fans, the kitchens came equipped with peeling linoleum and outdated appliances (like lead-lined, pea-green refrigerators and microwaves that could double as ship anchors), the wallpaper designs looked like a kaleidoscopic, acid-induced nightmare, and no one knew what the original color of the carpets was—maybe something between orange and brown.

As the tenth owners in a long line of alcoholics, Shih Tzu breeders, and other forms of poor yellow trash, the Ronins weren't too concerned with preserving the original aesthetic sanctity of their home. They were more concerned with trying to cram all of their belongings into a house with only three small bedrooms and almost no closet space.

Rowen and Kento shared a room. Not because they were already best pals and had known each other since they were kids, but because they had the same standards of slobbiness. (And FEMA could deal with a single area better than multiple ones.) Rowen's side of the room was cluttered with books, junk food litter, contraband paraphernalia, and computer equipment; Kento's side was an explosion of dirty laundry, dirty magazines and exercise equipment. They were a perfect match.

Sage roomed with Cye and that seemed to work out well enough. Cye was tidy, maybe not quite so meticulous as Sage, but he had a lot more sentimental junk and personal relics. Like British knick knacks and marine souvenirs, a library of vinyl records and a rather large hi-fi that doubled as a desk when not in use, and the walls on his side of the room were covered with posters and display shelves crowded with framed photographs. He even had a huge Union Jack pinned to the wall above his bed. It made Sage's side of the room look as sterile and plain as a hospital. Sage didn't have a lot of things. Just a small collection of Japanese swords and a bonsai that kept vigil on the window sill. He despised messes and he claimed that clutter disrupted his chi, but Cye was as good as he was ever going to get in this house.

And Ryo, thanks to White Blaze, had the third bedroom all to himself. He was messy like any other typical college-age guy, but at least he made an effort to keep his disaster confined. Unlike Kento and Rowen, who regularly jumped out of bed and tripped over their own garbage when Rowen's alarm would go off at six sharp. In fact, that's exactly where this story picks up.

The brass bell alarm clock, the only thing on earth capable of rousing Rowen from his deathlike slumber, went off like a fire alarm and Kento started his day with a seizure and a charlie horse in his left leg. While Hardrock did the Electrocution Mambo under his covers, Rowen slowly rolled over with a sleepy whine and knocked the clanging clock onto the floor. Where it continued to ring and beat circles over the laundry-strewn mess.

Rowen folded his pillow against his head and turned away, already on his way back to the Land of Nod. When Kento finally realized that he wasn't being blasted to the Pearly Gates, he crawled out of bed with a curse and punched the already-dented clock, effectively shutting it off. Sweet, beautiful silence. He wanted to lay down and enjoy it, but somebody's rotten socks (probably his own) were right near his face and their curdled, sweaty odor banished any desire to rest.

Kento dragged himself over to Rowen's bed and punched him (gently—Rowen was a bastard in the morning). "Rise n' shine, porcupine," he said cheerily. "It's time to get up."

"I jus wenna bed fi minsago."

"C'mon, you don't wanna be late for class."

"Yeaha do."

"I bet Cye's got a nice big stack of fluffy, warm pancakes waitin' for ya . . ."

"Nnh."

"Or a steamin' hot bowl of oatmeal . . . with maple syrup . . ."

"Ngh."

"Or a nice cold Mountain Dew and some Cookie Crisp . . ."

_That_ got him moving. Rowen rolled over with a groan and sat up: dark circles under his bloodshot eyes, pasty, greasy complexion, messed up hair, still wearing his jeans from yesterday—he looked better than usual this morning.

"I don't know why you sign up for these early summer classes, Ro," said Kento with a shake of his head.

"So I can go to school and get some sleep," he muttered. "Why d'ya think my first class is Differential Equations?"

Kento, like the rest of us, was too dumb to get the joke. So he picked himself off the floor, gave Rowen a hand out of bed, and left him at the bathroom door. Rowen could usually take it from there.

Kento thumped down the stairs and into the kitchen. Sage, dressed immaculately with perfect hair, was sipping his morning tea at the table. Cye sat beside him, polishing off a buttered crumpet and flipping through a NatGeo magazine. They both looked up and mumbled their curt good-mornings to Kento, who responded with mutual enthusiasm and went about gathering breakfast.

You might have noticed by now that Cye is not slaving over a hot stove like some kind of indentured galley bitch, and you are most observant. Allow me to clarify: a year or two ago, after the Ronins had really settled themselves at 32 Shinota Drive, Cye hosted a little Come To Jesus meeting regarding his duties as sole dispenser of the eaty things. He had said, in so many words, that if they were all going to survive together as housemates for any length of time, certain responsibilities had to be shared. Namely cooking. Because, for some reason or another, maybe due to his empathetic, maternal nature and natural flair for culinary art, Cye was getting saddled with preparing three squares a day for everyone (except Sage, of course, who took care of himself). A lot of resentment built up over the months until finally Cye snapped like a Slim Jim and scared the motherloving daylights out of them all in a hellstorm of screaming that the neighbors would never forget. No one had ever seen Cye that pissed off, nor had they ever heard him swear like he did that day. Black Saturday, they called it.

But Cye had later apologized for his behavior, a truce was declared and treaties were signed, and peace at last returned to Chez Ronin. Cye still cooked every now and then and Kento, perhaps the only other qualified chef in the house thanks to years of his precious youth spent in his parents' restaurant, shared some of the responsibility. He could make a mean pork fried rice, too. Everyone else was basically useless; Ryo burned everything he touched, often literally. Rowen's idea of fine food was a Dorito salad and Spamburgers. And Sage's austere dishes had about as much flavor as a box of crayons. Thank the Ancient One for Kento and Cye, otherwise they'd all die of scurvy.

Ryo entered the kitchen just as Kento sat down with a bowl of cereal. "Morning!" he said with a bright smile and a twinkling eye. Ever the team motivator. It was sweet sometimes, but this morning wasn't one of those times.

"Murn."

"Guhmuh."

"Mmn."

"Why's everybody so tired?" asked Ryo, sitting down in a chair backwards. "The sun's shining, the sky's blue, the birds are singing—it's a beautiful day!"

"To take a nap," Cye amended.

"Hey, at least you didn't have to listen to Rowen hammering on his computer all night long," Kento said. "I swear, if he doesn't lay off that World of Warcrap junk, I'm gonna apply for relocation. Hey Ryo, need a roommate?"

"Got one. And he snores."

"Gotta be better than a friggin' insomniac. Hey Sage, wanna switch with me?"

"No."

"Aw, c'monnn," whined Kento. "It'd work out great. You wouldn't take any of Rowen's crap. See, I'm too nice. I tolerate it. You'd whip him into shape, though."

"I'm not his mother. It's not my job."

"But you two work so well together!"

"On the battlefield. Not in the bedroom. Er." Sage coughed to cover up his blunder. "Besides, I don't condone his drug habit. I don't care what the government thinks, medical marijuana is still marijuana and it should be illegal."

"He needs pot for his diabetes, dude. You know that."

"Diabetes, my eye," Sage snapped, setting down his tea. "He's hypoglycemic and exaggerating. Honestly, only a country as stupid as Canada would grant Rowen a license to smoke. I bet his dad had something to do with it, too. I wouldn't be surprised if the whole family is a bunch of stoners."

"Jeez, Sage, calm down," Ryo tittered.

"I _am_ calm, thank you."

"You know," Cye drawled, "you're not easy to get along with either, Sage."

"Neither are you, Ringo. Speaking of which, when are you going to switch records? If I hear David Bowie's _Space Oddity_ one more time, I'm going to lose my mind."

"I'd like to see _that_."

"I'm serious."

"So am I. I'd pay good money to see you go stark raving shitty." He chuckled.

"Careful what you wish for."

"My dear Mister Datier, have you ever taken a step back to examine your own behavior? Snip-snip-snipping at that silly little tree of yours, bleaching your socks, folding and refolding your trousers to avoid even the smallest wrinkle—and I mean, really, how many times a day do you need to polish your sword?" Cye grinned lewdly. "Heh."

Sage flushed pink. "Apparently I hold myself to higher standards than you, Mister Maury. _Do_ pardon me—"

"Okay, guys. Time out." Ryo the Referee made the T with his hands. "Let's not ruin the morning."

The sound of screeching tires followed by a solid hit jinxed whatever was left of the morning. Sage facepalmed. "Sounds like the mail's here," Kento declared.

Cye stood up. "I'll go pay my respects to Sekhmet."

"Better bring him some black coffee," Sage advised. "Maybe that'll sober him up."

* * *

"Good morning, neighbor," Cye greeted in his best Mister Rogers impression.

Sekhmet peeled himself off of the steering wheel and stared blearily at the crowd of Britons in front of him. "What's the damage?" he grunted.

"Front fender and our mailbox. Don't worry about it. Here, have some coffee."

Sekhmet had to toggle his fly swatter to his other hand to accept the steaming cup. (He also carried two cans of Bee-Be-Gone on his belt, in case of random attacks.) "God bless you, Torrent," he said, throwing back the blistering hot beverage in one gulp. Half of it ended up on his uniform, but it was barely noticeable among the vomit stains.

"My pleasure," Cye answered haltingly as he took back the empty mug. "How's the route today? Bee free?"

"So far," Sekhmet said, giving his head a wet-dog shake. "Night's the worst. They mostly come at night. Mostly. I don't think they like the sun."

Jesus. If anyone needed medical marijuana, it was Sekhmet.

"How are the others doing?"

"The who?"

"The others. Dais and Cale. How are they?"

"Don't know. I hardly see Cale. I think Dais is working the streets again."

Cye grimaced. "Not the old street magician routine, is it?"

"No, no. He paints himself silver every morning and stands still all day long. And they think _I'm_ crazy." He reached down under his seat and cracked open a Bud. _So much for the coffee_, Cye thought.

"Well, I'd best be off now. Have a lovely mor—"

"Oh, wait, here. Let me get your mail." He riffled through the box beside him and withdrew a chunk of mail held together by a rubber band. He handed it to Cye and put the truck into reverse. "Have a nice day, Torrent."

"You, t—"

With a blast and a puff of blue smoke, Sekhmet the Mailman was careening down the street. Two wheels on the sidewalk.

"Blimey," Cye murmured sadly, returning to the house and sifting through the letters. Junk. Credit card offer. Bill. Bank statement. Another credit card offer. Junk. Junk. Magazine. Bill. Letter?

"Hel-lo," Cye said, spying a sturdy, cream-colored envelope with a handwritten address.

_930-0007 Toyama-shi, Toyama  
3-2-2  
Sage Datier_

_Well, Sage finally seems to have gotten some fanmail from home_, thought Cye as he returned to the kitchen. Only Ryo and Kento remained, chattering about the new movie coming out that week.

"Where's Sage?" asked Cye. "I've got some mail for him."

"He left a few minutes ago," Ryo replied. "Said something about vents."

"Vents? Ah, venting. Bother. Well, if you see him, could you give him this letter?"

"Sure." Ryo took the envelope and set it down, and both he and Kento watched silently as Cye cleared his breakfast dishes before finally leaving. Then they tore into the letter like ravenous piranhas.

"Quick! QUICK!" Kento screamed under his breath. "Hurry up and read it!"

"Hold on, you're gonna make me burn it!" Ryo sometimes had trouble controlling his excitement, which led to a lot of scorched mugs, charred pencils, and melted game controllers. It was a side effect of the armors. They all had their problems.

But none so much as Sage, whose mail was being violated by two greedy gossip-demons. They couldn't have been more shocked, however, when the envelope was torn away to reveal a plain-looking card. _Wishing you a happy birthday_, it said on the front. On the inside: _May your twenty-second year of life be prosperous and happy. Love, Mom, Dad, Yvette & Sophie_

"What, no money?" Kento marveled. "Bogus!"

Ryo's mouth had fallen open two minutes ago and had yet to shut. "Holy moly, Kento. What day is it?"

"Uh, the first or second. I think. Hell, it could be the nineteenth for all I—"

"Sage's birthday! We can't miss it!"

Kento blanked out. "Why not? We miss each other's birthdays all the time. I don't even know when Cye was born, and he's like my BFF."

"We miss each other's birthdays 'cause nobody knows when they are." Ryo held up the card. "But now we know, so we can plan something!"

Kento crossed his arms and pouted. "You guys never planned anything for me."

"Every _day_ is like a party to you, Kento. Besides, your folks give you tons of junk every year. All Sage gets is a lousy card from a family that pretty much ignores him. Why do you think he lives with _us_? Because he _likes_ it?" Ryo shook his head sadly. "No. _This_ year, Sage is gonna get this best birthday he's ever had."

Kento blinked. "Why do I get the feeling that he's going to hate all of us before this week is over?"

"You're just not thinking optimistically enough." Ryo sprang from his seat. "Now come on! We've got a birthday to plan!"


	6. It's My Party And I'll Die If I Want To

Sage didn't suspect a thing all week. He wasn't even suspicious by the fact that his birthday was only a few days away and he still hadn't gotten any mail from his family. Never mind that he had helped save the world like four times, gotten kidnapped by a mad scientist, and was the last male descendant of one of the greatest samurai generals of all time. Being successful and accomplished was never good enough in his family—you had to be _legendary_.

By this point in his life Sage was used to being ignored. Apparently Grandpa Date was still resentful about his only daughter marrying a sissy Frenchman and muddying centuries of pure Japanese blood with all those fair-haired, blue-eyed, European genes. Some of that grudge seemed to have passed itself on to Sage, who was the only one of his siblings to inherit his father's more flattering traits. (Like the honey-blond hair that earned him the nickname "Goldilocks" in grade school. You should have heard the guys when they found out about _that_ one—Sage thought the porridge jokes would never end.)

Aside from those few instances of attention (and that fiasco in the States a few years ago) Sage was, for the most part, shoved into the background and forgotten. The others didn't really know much about him despite all the years they'd been together, nor did they ever express any interest in wanting to know. Sage eventually got used to this, too. He understood. He wasn't a genius like Rowen or a heroic leader like Ryo. He didn't have Kento's carefree sense of humor, nor did he possess Cye's quick wit, warm heart and domestic prowess. Sage was plain and traditional and boring, and sometimes he got the feeling that the rest of the team would be a lot happier without him around.

So when he arrived home from kendo practice on June 9th and saw everyone sitting in the living room and smiling at him creepily, he was immediately suspicious.

"What is this, an intervention?" he asked, looking around worriedly. "Did somebody die?"

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" they cheered in unison. (They'd been working on their timing all afternoon, and finally managed to get it right within the last five minutes.)

Sage's bag slipped from his shoulder and clumped to the floor. "Oh no," he muttered.

Kento and Ryo sprang from the sofa and took up position on either side of their blond BFF. "We're gonna give you the best birthday ever, dude!" said Kento, grabbing Sage's bag and tossing it out of the way, probably breaking everything in it. "I hope you're ready to party!"

"Actually, no."

"We've got it all planned out!" Ryo went on, gushing with glee. "You're gonna have such an awesome time tonight you'll never—"

"How did you even know it was my birthday?" Sage interrupted coldly. "I don't remember telling any of you."

"Er, well . . . you didn't."

"See, Cye read this letter and told us that—"

"I did _no_ such thing! YOU two sneaky arseholes are responsible for—"

"Oh yeah, that reminds me." Ryo held out the mangled envelope to Sage. "This is from your parents."

Sage facepalmed for a few moments, sighed, then took the card. "Thank you, Ryo. If I ever need my privacy invaded, I know who to call."

"Aw, c'mon, don't be mad at us." Kento slung his muscular arm around Sage's slim shoulders. "You go every year without tellin' us it's your birthday, and we always feel bad about missin' it. We just wanna show you that we care about you and all that gay stuff, and as a special present we wanna treat you to a night on the town."

Rowen, who was chilling in the recliner, called out loudly, "Don't listen to 'em, Sage. They all hate your guts. _I'm_ the only one who loves ya. This was all my idea."

"As if, Captain Froot Loop," Kento snapped.

"I think what Kento _means_ to say," Cye translated, "is that we're all aware we're not the easiest chaps to get along with. You put up with a lot of our nonsense and we're grateful for your patience. We want to do something special since you always seem so neglected, so we're going to make sure you have a wonderful birthday this year." He ended it with a disarming smile.

Sage, while glad that at least one person in the household was tuned to his frequency, was still not convinced. "Something special just for me? . . . I'm touched. But seriously, what did you guys break this time? It's my Hattori Hanzo sword, isn't it?"

"We mean it, Sage," Ryo beamed. "We love ya, man."

"He's right," Cye nodded. "We do."

"Aw, group hug!" Kento cried, throwing his arms around Sage. Ryo joined in, then Cye sprang forward to beat Rowen to the last good hugging-spot, and it ended up looking like an American football pileup as they all crashed onto the floor, smushing poor little Seiji on the very bottom.

If this was any indication of how the rest of the evening was going to go, Sage thought he would rather ride shotgun with Sekhmet on a Monday morning mail route. Through Hell.

The next thing he knew, he was being hauled off the floor and hustled into the garage, where his compatriots rowdily jammed each other into the little Geo Tracker, cranked up the engine and the Greatest Dance Hits of the 90s, and were off.

* * *

The first stop of the evening was the Crown & Anchor pub. After embarrassing the life out of Sage by getting all of Cye's drunken seadog mates to sing a bawdy birthday song, the Ronins politely partook of the establishment's warm beer and fish and chips until it became clear that hurling was eminent and they had to leave. Unfortunately their designated driver had tanked himself on lager (everyone please point at Cye and boo) and was now unfit to operate a motor vehicle. Kento took the wheel and, after breaking at least four traffic laws in ten miles, delivered the boys to the Pink Pearl Gentlemen's Club.

Sage refused to get out of the car, and Kento had to pry him from the passenger's seat and drag him inside, where Sage promptly hid his face in his hands. It wasn't that he was afraid of the rest of the club's guests seeing him and possibly remembering him, but to hide the unhealthy red blush igniting his cheeks.

It was at this point in the evening when Sage realized that his friends really didn't know jack shit about him, because if they did, they would have remembered that 1) he was not a partier, 2) he was not a drinker, and 3) he suffered from an extreme case of social anxiety when in the presence of the opposite sex, and this was when the opposite sex was fully clothed. Going to a strip club could quite possibly scar him for the rest of his life. Thanks a lot, guys.

And nothing is more awkward than having a pair of bulging tits crammed into your face when you're just not feeling it. Tami and Rei-Rei tried their best, but Sage was mortified and unable to enjoy himself. He spent most of the time flinching and squirming every time the girls touched him, and having the others laugh and point out his awkwardness didn't help.

He endured two lap dances before he finally couldn't take it anymore and begged Kento to cover for him. It didn't take much cajoling to get Kento into that chair—in fact, everyone else seemed to be getting along just fine with the girls, especially Rowen, who was impressing them with his big sexy brain. Even Ryo, the shyest of the bunch, was grinning like a Cheshire cat as a hot brunette named Bibi gave him the once-over with her glittery hands. Nobody was really eager to leave, but when Sage threatened to get in the car and leave them all stranded and drunk, they grudgingly agreed and were on the road again.

Just when Sage thought it couldn't get any worse, it did.

The next stop was Dangle's. Dangle's the gay club. Dangle's the gay club that was having a drag show that very night. (Hey, those queens knew how to throw a party, and besides, the Ronins were all confident enough in their masculinity to embrace the rainbow every now and then.) While Sage was a little less petrified in this uproarious environment, he didn't much enjoy getting dragged on stage by a prancing pervert resplendent in full Cher regalia and dancing the tango. As a Dangle's specialty, any birthday boy was entitled to either a free handjob or a free round of drinks. Sage, who drank sake only on occasion, still opted for the latter and watched his friends get plastered and carry on with the flaming trannies. They had to leave when Ryo started to receive several ambiguous propositions and was too naïve to know what they meant (Ryo thought the nice ladies just needed help with their car wheels or were offering to buy him a salad or something).

They hit a few more clubs and bars that night, and by the time they were crawling into the Tracker for the last run, everyone except Sage was outrageously shitfaced and he had to take the wheel. The Ronin of Light was ready to call it a night and go home, but the others insisted—quite loudly—that if Sage so much as pointed the car toward home that he would wake up with a shaved head.

It's kind of like having a gun pressed to your temple and being told to have a good time or you'll be painting the walls with your brains. Sage, exhausted and miserable, obediently drove where he was commanded. And with four drunken and forgetful passengers, they spent a long time driving aimlessly around town. Rowen even busted out his hashpipe and he and Cye were passing it back and forth, waxing poetic about the core of the moon and if it had seeds or not.

And at half past one in the morning, the final destination was reached. Sage put the Tracker in park and stared with dread at the flashing red sign of the Wild Sushi Roadhouse. "Surpriiiiise!" Kento sang, rocking the whole vehicle as he bounced in his seat. "Time to LET LOOSE, YEEEE HAW!"

Sage leaned forward and rested his head on the wheel. "I hate all of you."

One by one they piled out of the car and plowed into the roadhouse, where nobody took notice because this was a roadhouse and people are expected to behave like animals. There wasn't a big crowd that night but the band was still playing, so the Ronins took up positions at the bar or the pool tables and jackassed their way into alcoholic stupors. Cye actually started a shot contest by accident and ended up drinking the other guy under the table. At his victory, he ripped open his button-down shirt, struck his chest with his fist, and roared something about bollocks.

Sage hid himself into the darkest corner he could find and sat at the table with his head resting in his folded arms, hating the world and cursing his friends and wondering why nobody seemed to understand him and generally being emo. He was starting to drift in and out of sleep when suddenly the table shifted as someone leaned against it.

Raising his head, he stared up at the dark figure of a man. "Please tell me we're getting thrown out."

"Not yet." Cale slid into the seat across from Sage and sent a sympathetic smile his way. He looked completely in his element, dressed in a tight black Harley Davidson shirt, fraying jeans, and cowboy boots. Manly, as usual. Sage tried to conceal his nausea.

"Thought I recognized you all," he said conversationally. "Odd place for a bunch of clean-cut young guys to be this time of night. What's the occasion?"

Sage slumped back in his chair and pointed glumly to himself.

"You?"

Nod.

". . . Are you dying?"

Sage couldn't help but laugh. Well, scoff was more like it, but he found it amusing that the others might very well be celebrating his death in this exact same manner. "It's my birthday."

"Really? Which one?"

"My first one, you idiot. What's it look like?" Silence fell, and Sage started feeling bad as his courtesy caught up to him. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap. It's not your fault this night has been so . . . awful."

"Why awful?"

"Do you care?"

Cale shrugged. "My shift's about to end. Nobody's left but you guys and the regulars. I've got a few minutes."

"I really don't think I want to discuss it right now."

"You sure?"

Sage smiled sourly. "Yeah."

Cale sighed, then stood up. "Alright then. Suit yourself." And he walked away, boots thudding on the floor.

Sage put his head back down on the table and forbade himself to even think about his former nemesis. The last thing he needed on a night like this was to end it on a note like Cale, that swaggering, shady, knuckle-dragging caveman. Sage went back to torturing himself with thoughts of his jerk friends and dispassionate family, and he was just about to fall asleep again when Cale returned, wearing his leather jacket, and tapped his shoulder.

Sage lifted his head drowsily. "Now what?"

"Come on. You've had enough for one night." He took Sage's arm and pulled him up, guiding him toward the door. Sage followed, perturbed but too tired to protest.

The night was cool and quiet outside the roadhouse, free from the odor of cigarettes and booze. Scanning the empty parking lot, Sage became alarmed. "Where's the car?"

"Gone," Cale replied, dropping down into the saddle of his FatBoy.

"_Gone_?"

"I asked Joey to drive your friends home. He lives on that same side of town, so it won't be a problem." He kicked his bike to life. It roared upon ignition, then quieted to a gentle growl. He glanced up at Sage. "Hop on. I'll take you home."

Sage flipped his lid. "Are you _nuts_? I'm not getting on that Hindenburg of a motorcycle! I don't have a helmet, and it's dark out, too. You probably don't even have a license, and I _know_ you and Kento have been screwing around with the engine, and frankly I don't trust that thing to carry its own weight let alone—"

"GET ON THE BIKE, HALO."

Sage shut up and deliberated his situation a moment. It wasn't good, and his options were pretty slim at this point. He didn't feel like walking home, that was for sure. With a frustrated growl he slid into place behind Cale and sulked. Cale twisted the throttle a few times. "Hold on," he murmured.

Baring his teeth in a silent snarl, Sage locked his arms around Cale's waist and they pulled out of the parking lot and into the June night.

* * *

Sage knew they had to be taking the long way, because it seemed like they were driving _around_ the city instead of _through_ it. The thought crossed his mind that this might be the last birthday he would ever see because Cale was going to take him to some remote location in the woods and do very bad things to him, strangle him, kill him, cut out his heart and his intestines and use them to trim a tree or something equally gruesome and hilarious, and after a few sobering moments of vivid visualization, Sage has worked himself into a terrified lather.

His thoughts seemed correct, however; they were high on a desolate mountain road when Cale slowed, pulled over in the gravelly right-of-way, and cut the engine. Sage wondered if he ought to try punching the Warlord and then running, or just run and get as far away as possible. Yeah, that sounded better. Then he could call his armor and whip out his no-datchi and slice the—

Cale put down the kickstand and stepped off, leaving Sage unmoving and bewildered. He watched Cale put his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket and stare up at the sky. "I like coming here after a bad day. It helps me put things into perspective."

The blond gingerly dismounted the Harley and wandered over to where Cale stood. The lights of the city glittered below like a circuit board, and the deep cobalt sky above was dusted with sparkling stars. The moon, a solid white orb, hung in the sky like a radiant jewel, sharp with clarity, washing the earth in cool blue light. _Huh_, Sage thought, _moonlight really _is_ blue._

Crossing his arms over his chest to ward off the slight chill, Sage tried to imagine what the world might look like to someone who had known it hundreds of years before, back when electricity existed only in lightning bolts and technology was still made of wood. It wasn't all that hard, standing beneath stars like these. Here you felt about as big as a grain of sand, and something as important as one puny human's birthday was really trivial and meaningless. Certainly not worth crying over.

Sage turned to look over at Cale, smiling as he realized this stop was no accident. "You're right. It does help put things into perspective."

Cale winked. "You should come riding with me more often. I'm not such a bad guy once you get to know me."

"One thing at a time, Warlord, one thing at a time."

They shared a chuckle, then the wind picked up suddenly, sending Sage's hair into disarray. He tightened his arms around himself and tried not to think about how much colder it was going to be on the way back. His fears were in vain, because the next thing he knew something warm was draped about his shoulders. He glanced over and saw Cale—sans jacket—give him a sheepish smile.

Sage was flabbergasted for a few seconds, unable to believe that the man who had once upon a time been bent on disemboweling him was now chivalrously lending his best piece of leather to him. It was embarrassing, of course, for this cliché 1950s First Date on Lookout Hill kind of thing they had going on, but underneath the shame and loathing and awkward feelings, Sage was flattered. So flattered that he was instantaneously transformed into a shy, self-conscious, blushing, distressingly and unbearably adorable Boy Next Door.

"Um . . . thank you. B-but you know, you don't have to do this," he began rattling, "not that I'm not grateful, I am, really. Thank you. It's just that, uh, well, it's a polite gesture but I'm not cold at all . . . well, no, that's not true. I _am_ a bit chilly (not anymore, thanks to you), but it's summer, you know, so it's not really _that_ chilly. I mean, I've been cold before it's not like I've never been cold, in fact I've been a lot colder than this so I don't really require any—"

As Sage continued to dig his grave, Cale was paying no attention, at least to the nonsensical rambling; he was instead distracted by the soft ethereal light radiating from Sage's body. At first he thought it might just be the moonlight reflecting off his pale skin, but as Cale continued to stare, the more certain he became that Sage was not just blushing—he was _glowing_. The Ronin of Light, his spirit stimulated by the virtue of grace he was being shown—by the Warlord of Darkness, no less—was wreathed in a white halo. Cale was enchanted.

"—and it's very very awkward, you know. Usually it's _me_ being the polite one so whenever somebody actually does something nice for me I don't know how to react and I end up talking like this and making a fool of myself and I want to just _stop_ but I feel if I just _stop_ then it's going to be even more awkward so I just keep talking until I can think of a good way to end it and then I—"

"Sage."

"Yes?"

Cale leaned in. "It's just a jacket."

"Ah. Right . . . so it is."

The Warlord shook his head, still grinning. "Come on. I'd better get you home before you light up the whole town."

Sage's eyes went wide. "Oh no. Was I . . . ?"

"Yeah."

Facepalm. "Great. Just great."

"Look, don't worry about it. I don't care. I think it's kind of fascinating, actually."

Sage settled in behind Cale. "Really? You seriously think that?"

"Yeah. It makes you a lot easier to read," he chuckled, then started the Harley with a kick. "Long way or short way?"

Sage struggled to hide his bashful smile. And his glow. "The long way, please."

A few revs later and the bike's red taillights were disappearing into the darkness.

* * *

By the time they were rumbling down Shinota Drive, it was going on half past three in the morning. Cale steered his ride into the driveway of Masho Manor and killed the engine. The world became suddenly quiet, disturbed only by the chirping of crickets. No cars, no people, no lights on inside either house—it made this ordinary, everyday setting almost mystical.

Sage slid out of the seat and handed back the jacket. "Thanks for the ride home," he said in a soft voice. "And the jacket. I appreciate it."

Cale continued to sit on his bike and gaze at him, still transfixed by the Ronin's faint glow. "Sure. Anytime."

An awkward pause followed. "Well," Sage fumbled, "good night."

The Warlord inclined his head, the scar over his left eye shifting as he smiled. "Good night, Sunshine."

Sage gave a little wave and turned to walk next door. Cale's eyes followed him. Sage waved again when he reached the porch. Cale returned it, but stayed where he was. Only after Sage had fished out his key and stepped inside did the Warlord heave a long sigh and drag himself out of the saddle.

"Nice night for a ride." Dais was sitting in a lawn chair inside the garage, his skin a motley patchwork of silver paint beneath his shirt and jeans. He looked rough. Rougher than a guy with long hair and an eye patch already looks.

Cale walked up to his housemate and gave him an appraising stare. "It's a bit late to be up, don't you think?"

"It's okay. No work tomorrow."

"Day off?"

"No. The mimes didn't like me working their turf, so they ganged up on me and ran me off." Sigh.

"But you kicked their asses, right?"

"I can't kick a mime's ass. That's . . . wrong, somehow. Like beating up an ugly kid. They can't help it if they're ugly."

Cale shook his head in pity. "Looks like coming to the mortal world wasn't such a great idea, was it?"

"It seems to be working well enough for you." Dais glanced over Cale's shoulder, in the direction that Sage had departed. "Looks like you and Halo are becoming quite a pair. What's _that_ all about? You know he's only twenty-two, right?"

That was news to Cale, who blinked with surprise. "He's that old? Damn. I thought he was seventeen or something."

Dais massaged his forehead where the cord of his eyepatch was leaving a nice line. "You chased after him realizing that he might be jailbait . . . Are you really that obsessed with him? Have you forgotten that you're over 400 years old? The age difference between you two is insurmountable. Why can't you just leave the poor boy alone?"

Cale was too manly to whine, so he covered his hopelessness with a mask of anger. "I can't help it," he snapped. "He's my opposite. The yin to my yang. It's destined that the dark should seek the light. He is my other half. I can't live without him. He drives me crazy. I think about him all the time. I don't even know why. All I know is that when I'm around him I finally feel whole again." He narrowed his eyes at his clearly miserable companion. "Maybe if you spent a little time around Hardrock you'd feel the same way."

"The only thing I feel around Hardrock is the urge to flee. Whatever you're feeling toward Halo is all you, Cale. Face it—you're a pervert."

"Yeah? Well you're a depressing one-eyed loser."

"At least I'm not lusting after my former _enemy_, when I'm old enough to be his great great great great great great _grandfather_."

Cale pinched his lips into a rigid frown and glared at Dais. "Fine. You win. I surrender. I'm not going to let your negative attitude ruin my day." He stomped past Dais and to the door. "Enjoy the rest of the night, Your Nastiness."

Dais winced at the slamming door, then relaxed a few moments later. _That went over well_, he thought dully. Still, someone had to try to keep that poor kid out of Cale's insidious clutches. _Might as well be me. Great. The first job I get and it doesn't even pay._

* * *

**AND NOW A WORD FROM THE DEVIL . . . I MEAN THE AUTHOR**

As a special bonus, since you guys are all so awesome and leave me such great reviews, here's Sage's birthday theme song. (Sincerest apologies to Lesley Gore.)

**It's My Party (And I'll Die If I Want To)**

It's my party and I'll die if I want to  
Die if I want to, die if I want to  
You would die too if it happened to you

I didn't want to get dragged out tonight  
I didn't want to leave home  
It's just my birthday and I  
Would rather spend it alone

It's my party and I'll die if I want to  
Die if I want to, die if I want to  
You would die too if it happened to you

Hitting the bars and the strip clubs all night  
Watching my friends have a ball  
By midnight I'm thinking I'd  
Be happy killing them all

It's my party and I'll die if I want to  
Die if I want to, die if I want to  
You would die too if it happened to you

Last stop and I just can't take anymore  
Worst night I've ever had  
Till Cale gives me a ride home  
I guess he's not so bad

It's my party and I'll die if I want to  
Die if I want to, die if I want to  
You would die too if it happened to you

Oh-oh-oh, it's my party and I'll die if I want to  
Die if I want to, die if I want to . . .


End file.
